Friday 11 May 2012 04.05 EDT
First published on Friday 11 May 2012 04.05 EDT

US government investigators interviewed the Colombian woman at the centre of a secret service prostitution scandal, which has cost eight officers and supervisors their jobs and become an election-year embarrassment for the Obama administration.

Dania Londono Suarez voluntarily met investigators at the US embassy in Madrid, agency spokesman Edwin Donovan said. He said the secret service investigation was nearly complete. More than 200 people, including most of the women involved, have been interviewed in the US and Colombia.

Londono mysteriously disappeared days after the incident and could not be reached by investigators.

In a radio and television interview from Madrid on 4 May, Londono said she works as a prostitute in Colombia, catering to foreigners. She said after leaving Colombia she spent some time in Dubai before going to Madrid.

Londono said she met a drunken secret service employee last month at a club in Cartagena, Colombia, and escorted him back to his hotel after a night of partying.

"I told him it would be $800 (£500) and he said that was fine and not a problem," Londono said in Spanish. The next morning, however, the officer refused to pay, offering her only about $30 for a taxi. Londono said she was insulted and tried for several hours to get paid, eventually asking a local police officer at the hotel for help.

She said the argument ended when other secret service officers at the Hotel Caribe paid her about $250. The officers were in Colombia in advance of President Barack Obama's arrival for a South American summit.

Prostitution is legal in Colombia.

A dozen employees have been implicated since the 12 April argument became public. Eight people, including two supervisors, have lost their jobs. The agency is moving to revoke permanently the security clearance for one other employee, and three others have been cleared of serious wrongdoing. Twelve military personnel also have been implicated.

Londono left Colombia a few days after the incident, and she said last week she had not been contacted by the secret service or anyone from the US government. She described the officers involved as "fools" and said the situation could have been avoided if the man she spent the night with had just paid her.

"There wouldn't have been a problem if he had paid me money," Londono said.

Since the incident in Colombia, there have been several media reports of similar secret service misconduct in the past, including allegations that officers hired strippers and prostitutes during a presidential trip to El Salvador last year.

The homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, told a US Senate panel last month there had been no reports of such misconduct filed with the agency's Office of Professional Responsibility in the last two and a half years. She later said there was no evidence to corroborate the allegations from El Salvador.

Donovan declined to discuss the reports from El Salvador on Thursday, but he has said that any credible reports of misconduct would be investigated.

Since the scandal emerged, secret service director Mark Sullivan has issued new conduct rules for officers and agents travelling abroad. In some cases, chaperones will be sent on trips, and employees will be barred from visiting disreputable establishments, drinking heavily or within 10 hours of a shift. The new rules also bar employees from bringing guests into their hotel rooms.